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Hey Cookie, really appreciate the encouragement! Thanks man - got the bearings chilling in the freezer next to the fish fingers
Thanks for the bolt tip, I'm going to do that for sure. Every day I'm learning something new - sometime down the line perhaps I'll be in position to help the next new guy out
Bolt worked a charm. Fitted it up with some washers the same size as the bearings and got them all sitting pretty. Used the old bearings too to guide the new ones in - can now tick "rear wheel bearing replacement" off the bucket list.
Truth be told the whole bearing escapade was not a high point in the build thus far. And I still have the front wheel.
Feels really good. Got a jack and axle stands yesterday so moving on to the front wheel today - first thing I've come up against is the screw securing the speedo cable to into the lower fork, can't get that thing moved for love for money and I'm hesitant about giving it a whack with the impact driver. I'll give it some mustard and see if I get lucky
The head was shot, rusted and stripped. So drilled into the bolt and got lucky again with the bolt puller. Man, I love that thing, saved my ass a few times now.
Finally got the complete wiring harness removed, got the front wheel off and about to tackle the bearings.
Goddam front wheel bearings, can't shift those little shites for love or money. So called my man Jimmy and for $20 he'll get them out with his puller. Money well spent.
So then I got these weird-ass foot pegs off -
- with my little ol' dremel (took a while) -
and got 'em cleaned up pretty good -
So now no random foot pegs badly welded to the frame
I'm working on a 79 and it's not the worst but definitely not a simple bike to work on. I'm almost done with mine but I did experience a long period of stagnation that was hard to break. If I had to do it over again, I would perform ONE mod at a time and never do back to back mods that required the bike to stop running. I dug too deep all at once and got to a place where it was difficult to know what I should work on. I was impatient basically, wanted to chop things off and see new parts on it. It required some shop help to get the project moving again. One at a time, all the way to completion before moving on, in my opinion.
The thing is, DOHC's don't want to be tinkered with, there are very few universal parts and it's over-engineered, lots of bizarre factory elements that require fabrication even for simple things. For instance, want the air box gone? U must remove the plastic which means chopping off mounting tabs which means grinding, filling in, refinishing and painting frame tubes on an assembled bike. If u remove that air box you will have to decide on exhaust and do that simultaneously because you will need to jet the carbs for both your air filter and pipe set up. But now the plastic is gone, where are you going to put that butt ugly battery housing? Hell, u need lithium ion to change the battery position. How about the wiring harness all around it? So you see what happened to me, something as simple as "I don't like this nasty air box" becomes a chain of a dozen things that all need to be done. Now if you had also tried to change your seat and air box at the same time, you'll be amazed how disassembled your 81' K suddenly looks and some days, it'll be tough to figure out where to even begin. Take your time friend, all good things in time. It's a great bike, I love mine even more than my SOHC which is saying a lot.
I hear you Chronic, one step at a time. I wrote the book on being impatient, trying to get all zen'd out in the garage but it's totally against my grain. Still, I've found on more than one occasion that taking a deep breath and a step away is a good look - today being one of them.
Beer's also a remarkable ally when things get sketchy.
Today I finally got the front wheel bearings out and the new ones installed. Thing is, now that the new ones are in there is no movement on the inner race on either bearing whatsoever - does this mean they're seated too tight? Too snug up against the spacer or the wheel hub? Do I gotta pull them out a little to free them up?
Figured I'm gonna pull 'em. At least try and open the gap up a little between one of the bearings and the spacer, and see if that gets them spinning again. Hopefully they won't get damaged? Not sure how much (if any) attack the inner race will take before ruining the bearing's alignment, but I'm taking the wheel to the shop and will get my guy to use his puller as frugally as possible. Guess if they get ruined then I've learned a valuable lesson and - thanks to All Balls - not the most expensive one.
That's what I'm hoping - my man Jimmy has the proper bearing pulling tool and so hopefully we can get the thing shifted enough to free everything up. Lesson learned - bearings can be seated too deep.
Yep, I have not had that issue as the comstars have a stop built it for the outside race and so can't go in too far. It's the spoke wheel you need to be careful with.
Ah, good to know. Tolerances are all pretty small on these bikes for a reason (just ask my valves - 1/1000ths there make all the difference) and I guess the best way (well, maybe not the best way but one way anyway) is to find out where the tolerance is and then dial it down. Like most things so far, I'll know for next time.
Yep you seated it just a hair too much. You may be able to LIGHTLY tap it back out a tiny bit without damaging. I have done it once before and managed to save the bearings, but the last time I did it I just replaced the bearings cuz like you said, they're cheap.
I wonder if you could use a very thin bent feeler gauge under the bearing while seating it to allow for a bit of clearance? Just a thought.
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